In a letter to Wordsworth in 1815, Charles Lamb wrote thus of _The Force of Prayer_, "Young Romilly is divine; the reasons of his mother's grief being remediless. I never saw parental love carried up so high, towering above the other loves. Shakspeare had done something for the filial in Cordelia, and, by implication, for the fatherly too, in Lear's resentment; he left it for you to explore the depths of the maternal heart.... When I first opened upon the just mentioned poem, in a careless tone, I said to Mary, as if putting a riddle, '_What is good for a bootless bene?_' To which, with infinite presence of mind (as the jest-book has it), she answered, 'A shoeless pea.' It was the first joke she ever made.... I never felt deeply in my life if that poem did not make me feel, both lately and when I read it in MS." (_The Letters of Charles Lamb_, edited by Alfred Ainger, vol. i. p. 288.)--ED. VARIANTS: [1] 1820. ... from ... 1815. [2] 1820. And the Pair ... 1815. [3] 1850. This ... 1815. [4] 1820. ... with ... 1815. [5] 1820. Now is there ... 1815. [6] 1815. And deep ... 1827. The text of 1837 returns to that of 1815. FOOTNOTES: [A] See _The White Doe of Rylstone_.--W. W. 1820. [B] Charles Lamb wrote to Wordsworth, May 1819, of Rogers--"He has been re-writing your Poem of the Strid, and publishing it at the end of his 'Human Life.' Tie him up to the cart, hangman, while you are about it." (_The Letters of Charles Lamb_, edited by Alfred Ainger, vol. ii. p. 20.)--ED. [C] The Lady Alice De Romilly built not only Bolton Priory, but the nave of Carlisle Cathedral, and the chancel of Crosthwaite Parish Church at Keswick.--ED. [D] "Young Romilly" was a son of Fitz Duncan, Earl of Murray in Scotland, whose Cumbrian estates extended from Dunmail Raise to St. Bees. This "Boy of Egremond" was second cousin of Malcolm, King of Scotland; and by the marriage of Fitz Duncan's sister (Matilda the Good) with Henry I. of England, he stood in the same relation to Henry II. of England. Fitz Duncan married Alice, the only daughter and heiress of Robert de Romilly, lord of Skipton. Compare Ferguson's _History of Cumberland_, p. 175.--ED. [E] Alluding to a Ballad of Logan's.--W. W. 1807. [F] From the same Ballad.--W. W. 1807. COMPOSED WHILE THE AUTHOR WAS ENGAGED IN WRITING A TRACT, OCCASIONED BY THE CONVENTION OF CINTRA. 1808 Composed 1808.--Published 1815 This sonnet was included among those "dedicated to Liberty."--ED.